Re: But how do they do it? (Was: Re: New Maxwell on ebay)

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Original poster: "Dr. Resonance" <resonance-at-jvlnet-dot-com> 


4 yrs ago I toured the Maxwell Co. in San Diego.  It was very interesting.

They use a polypropylene film only .0005 inch thick (1/2 mil) and foil that
is 1 mil thick.  This prohibits the use of human hands to touch the foil or
dielectric.  They wind in a special clean room and it's all done by
computers and expensive foil winders.

They also have a special proprietary method of actually soldering the alum.
end foils together.

High tech makes it all small.

Experience makes it work.  For example, how many homebrew cap builders do
you know that use rubber gloves when they handle and assemble their caps?
Most are unaware that the sodium salts in your hand oils are highly
conductive --- touch an area between the plate and the edge of the
dielectric and you now create an area for corona --- and eventual fault.
Maxwell employees never touch the raw material after its assembled.  Robots
and machines do it all.  The guys in the winding room wear complete "clean
suits" like you see in IC chip manufacturing processes.

Maxwell even had some "trade secret" techniques that they would not show
anyone.

Dr. Resonance

Resonance Research Corporation
E11870 Shadylane Rd.
Baraboo   WI   53913
----- Original Message -----
From: "Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
To: <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
Sent: Thursday, August 05, 2004 7:18 PM
Subject: But how do they do it? (Was: Re: New Maxwell on ebay)


 > Original poster: "Gregory Hunter" <ghunter31014-at-yahoo-dot-com>
 >
 > I've been following this thread, and I hafta know--if
 > any of you know--how do Maxwell and other commercial
 > cap builders do it? How do they get so much
 > high-voltage capacitance into such a small package? If
 > they are using polypropylene film, then why are
 > homebuilt caps of similar performance so much bulkier
 > than Maxwells? Are Maxwell, Plastic Capacitors Inc.,
 > et al, not bound by the capacitance formula like us
 > mortals? I'm aware that detailed info on this is
 > proprietary, but in general terms, how the heck do
 > they stuff so much multi-kv pulse cap into such a
 > small box???
 >
 > Just Curious,
 >
 > Greg
 >
 >  > Scot, All,
 >  >
 >  > Actually the 37xxx units are rated to 1000 pps,
 >  > plenty high for TC duty.
 >  > The 31xxx series are the ones rated at 1 pps.  Most
 >  > of the 37xxx are rated
 >  > to 25 Arms as well, and the shot life specified
 >  > (typically 10^8 or 10^9) is
 >  > at 20% voltage reversal.  Unfortunately I have no
 >  > knowledge of the 35xxx
 >  > series . . .
 >  >
 >  > Sean Taylor
 >  > Urbana, IL
 >  >
 >
 >
 >